University Medical Centre Utrecht - UCMU

The Wilhelmina Children’s Hospital of the University Medical Centre Utrecht (UCMU) is one of the leading institutes in paediatric immunology in Europe. The department is renowned for its research in the field of human autoimmune diseases. For years the group has been working on immune regulatory aspects of Juvenile Idiopathic Arthritis and its main focus is immune tolerance and biomarker research.

Our main tasks in this project will be; i) to develop and apply the Multiplex Immuno Assay technology (Luminex) and ii); to provide the cohorts of patients with JIA. More specifically we will work with the other partners in WP4 to set up and develop a specific Luminex panel that can be used for identification of inflammation-related biomarkers in this project. In WP5 we will apply and further develop this tailor-made set in patient cohorts to identify panels that can be used to predict response to therapy and/or true immunologic remission. We will also provide the necessary cohorts of patient with JIA that will be tested for this project (WP4 and WP5).